Rogers Communications Inc. has announced an $80-million investment to further enhance its reliable wireless voice and data network in the Maritimes. This investment significantly enhances wireless service in the region by providing Rogers 4G HSPA+ coverage to almost one million more people across Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island , representing a 130 percent increase over current population coverage.

This two-year multi-million dollar project is the latest in a series of major investments in the area and one of the largest to date by Rogers in the Maritime region. The investment will see Rogers 4G HSPA+ network expand to cover 94 percent of the Maritime population. Customers across all parts of the region will benefit from faster data speeds and stronger signal strength. They will also be able to take full advantage of the latest devices including Android, iPhone, BlackBerry and tablets.

"Maritimers told us they wanted better coverage, faster speeds and a greater selection of mobile devices," said Rogers President for Atlantic Canada, Ken Marshall. "With this investment, customers all across the Maritimes can fuel their passions by switching to Rogers and connecting - in high speed, on the device they want - to what matters to them most."

"The freedom and choice enabled by the expanded Rogers network will change the way we live and work here," said Marshall. "In more places than ever before, the Rogers enhanced 4G HSPA+ network will be readily available, making communications better and easier for new and existing Rogers' customers in the Maritimes."

Rogers begins work on its enhanced Maritime wireless network this month and work will continue through 2012.

The $80-million dollar investment is part of Rogers' ongoing commitment to delivering leading edge networks to Canadians coast to coast. In April, Rogers announced a multiyear deployment of its next generation technology - Long Term Evolution (LTE) - that will enable unparalleled connectivity, giving customers a mobile broadband experience similar to what they currently experience at home and at work. Rogers' customers in Toronto , Montreal , Vancouver and Ottawa will experience LTE this year, expanding to a total of 25 cities by the end of 2012. Top of Page

Counterpath launches hosted NCG Exchange

CounterPath Corporation , an award-winning provider of desktop and mobile Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) software solutions, has announced the launch of the CounterPath Network Convergence Gateway (NCG) Exchange, a hosted service enabling wireline operators to provide Fixed Mobile Convergence (FMC) services immediately, inexpensively and on any mobile network. Operators can implement these services, which include Voice Call Continuity (VCC), Instant Messaging, presence and SMS, in a matter of weeks and without the need to invest in any infrastructure.

CounterPath's NCG Exchange provides telcos, cable operators, hosted VoIP providers, Internet telephony service providers, CLECs and other wireline operators with a rapid, cost-effective way to expand into the mobile market, including targeting enterprises that have a large and growing number of mobile workers. With NCG Exchange, wireline operators can immediately provide their enterprise, SMB and SOHO customers with mobile VoIP and messaging services that are delivered over-the-top (OTT) of mobile networks, regardless of which carrier the customer uses.

Hosted and provisioned by CounterPath, NCG Exchange services work with any mobile handset - including smartphones and feature phones - without the requirement to install any software on the mobile handset. To further enhance the NCG Exchange service, operators can choose to deploy CounterPath's Bria iPhone Edition or Bria Android Edition softphones, giving their customers the additional options of communicating over Wi-Fi and 3G/4G IP alongside the standard mobile voice and SMS channels. Operators can also leverage CounterPath's Bria desktop/laptop PC or Mac softphones, allowing their customers to use their communications services seamlessly across both desktop softphones and mobile phones.

NCG Exchange's highly flexible, network- and device-agnostic architecture means a wireline operator's customers now can put a single phone number on their business cards with the confidence that they can always communicate with a single number by voice, IM and SMS - an ability that goes beyond rudimentary find-me/follow-me services. The technology behind NCG Exchange is unique to CounterPath and leverages the company's intellectual property portfolio , which includes patents that enable single-number identities and seamless service delivery across disparate fixed, mobile, legacy and IMS networks.

Other benefits to wireline operators include:

New revenue sources . Wireline operators now can offer SMS-to-VoIP and VoIP-to-SMS messaging services to their customers. SMS is a premium service for end users and promotes greater adoption of VoIP softphones.

Expedite service launch. NCG Exchange is fast and easy for operators to implement within weeks instead of months. Operators can refine and take NCG services in-house as they ramp traffic on the NCG Exchange platform.

"NCG Exchange gives wireline operators a fast, cost-effective way to remain relevant in a communications environment that is moving beyond voice and fixed-location communications," said Todd Carothers , Senior Vice President of Marketing and Products, CounterPath. "Sprint's recent integration of Google Voice , including offering unlimited calls to mobile users and a single voicemail box, highlights a new trend in mobile VoIP. CounterPath's NCG Exchange provides mobile, cable telephony and wireline operators with powerful new options for capitalizing on that trend while going beyond rudimentary find-me/follow-me services, such as Google Voice, to provide a suite of enterprise-grade single-number services. NCG Exchange puts operators in complete control of services creation so they can maximize revenue opportunities, protect their margins and fend off Skype, Rebtel and other companies that are encroaching on their markets." Top of Page

Hackers compete to create life-saving apps

Disaster professionals working with volunteer software makers in Toronto on Saturday and Sunday came together to build a set of mobile and online emergency aid tools whose prototypes they completed on Sunday, some teams coding right up until the pitch competition yesterday evening.

Global collaboration was the theme of the weekend, the winning team, collaborated with RHoK Atlanta and utilized the skills found there to put together a complete and innovative mobile application. The teams at Random Hacks of Kindness Toronto (RHoK Toronto ) are among some 1,000 people in 18 cities across six continents participating in a global weekend-long hacking marathon, or "hackathon," that unites technologists and humanitarian experts in an effort to solve pressing problems.

"It's amazing to see the collaboration between cities," said Heather Leson, lead organizer of RHoK Toronto . "If a team in Toronto didn't have the skills they needed, our team found people in other cities with those skills and they connected via Skype to share expertise"

Winning projects

The Judges had a hard time deciding on the top three prizes at Ontario Institute for Studies in Education in downtown Toronto . Projects were assessed Creativity of the Solution, Applicability, Utility, Progress and Impact.

1st Prize: Messages without Connectivity- A mobile app that can use Twitter, Facebook, e-mail and other notification services to deliver emergency messages even when cellular phone networks have stopped working, and can alert rescue workers when someone is alive under a collapsed building.

2nd Prize: Bacon- An alerts tool that uses a mobile phone's bluetooth, wifi or cellphone capabilities to send an audible and digital alert once activated to signal a person's whereabouts in the event of an emergency.

3rd Prize: Wound Classification Application: A telemedicine tool that would help people in remote or disaster-stricken areas to visually diagnose life-threatening wounds and help them seek treatment.

"The winning hackers took home first prize because they pitched a fully built mobile application that can be used to alert emergency responders, nearby volunteers and family during a disaster situation," said Melanie Gorka , Toronto Manager. "They fulfilled all of the judging criteria and had that extra 'wow' factor". The team took home Linksys routers by Cisco, a private lunch with leaders at Mozilla Foundation, which makes the Firefox Web browser and the chance to showcase their application at an unconference as part of Net Change Week in Toronto . Top of Page

OnX to acquire Agilysys' Tech Solutions Group

OnX Enterprise Solutions is pleased to announce that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire the Technology Solutions Group from Agilysys Inc., a leading provider of innovative, enterprise-class IT solutions. The $474 million-revenue Technology Solutions Group (TSG) business was purchased for $64 million by OnX. OnX Enterprise Solutions, an industry-defining designer and operator of mission-critical computing environments, is based in Toronto , Canada , with offices in the United States and Europe .

"The combination of OnX and TSG will create North America's leading IT solutions provider focused solely on providing mission-critical, multi-vendor data centre solutions to medium and large enterprises," says Sheldon Pollack , co-founder and Director of OnX Enterprise Solutions. "The combined organization will have annual revenues in excess of $700 million and will be ideally positioned to serve clients with requirements on both sides of the border."

The increased scale will allow OnX to better serve its global clients across their complete range of IT needs: Hardware, Software, Server, Networking, Consulting, Hosting, Cloud and Digital/Application Development services.

"OnX clearly recognizes the intrinsic value of TSG. The combination provides a great opportunity for TSG to accelerate its transformation into a multi-vendor, client-focused solutions provider," remarked James Dennedy, President and CEO of Agilysys.

"We look forward to welcoming TSG's employees, partners and clients to the OnX family. Our two businesses are highly complementary, with a similar business strategy, shared vision and a culture focused on exceptional client value," notes OnX President and CEO, Ed Vos. He continues, "This is a tremendously exciting time for OnX as we enhance our ability to add value to the world's leading technology vendors in order to better serve our mutual customers."

The transaction is subject to approval by Agilysys shareholders and is expected to close in the Company's fiscal 2012 second quarter, which ends September 30 , 2011. The merged company will operate under the OnX brand. Top of Page

"We are extremely pleased to continue to be ranked among the top growing companies in Canada ," said Ms. Sally Daub , President and CEO of ViXS Systems Inc. "ViXS' multimedia network processors continue to see strong demand from customers worldwide - our components are leaders in advanced processing of multimedia content for home networking and infrastructure applications."

Ranking Canada's Fastest-Growing Companies by five year revenue growth, the PROFIT 200 profiles the country's most successful growth companies. Published in the Summer issue of PROFIT and online at PROFITguide.com, the PROFIT 200 is Canada's largest annual celebration of entrepreneurial achievement.

"The PROFIT 200 companies are the innovative, high-growth enterprises Canada needs to compete on the global stage," says Ian Portsmouth , Editor-in-Chief of PROFIT Magazine. "PROFIT is proud to celebrate their achievements and ambitions, and we encourage all businesspeople to learn more about the many ways they've come so far, so fast." Top of Page

Yangaroo hits advertising network milestone

YANGAROO Inc. , the industry's leading secure digital media distribution company, has launched its U.S. Advertising Division with key agencies on board for the delivery of their clients' television commercial spots. YANGAROO's patented Digital Media Distribution System (DMDS), led by veteran broadcast and advertising industry executive Karen Dealy , enables advertisers to send high quality SD and HD video spots to television broadcasters digitally via the Internet, helping both the advertising and broadcast industries transition to more efficient digital workflows.

DMDS offers advertisers and their brands an efficient and cost effective means to distribute campaigns in both SD and HD formats throughout the broadcast marketplace. YANGAROO's patented Digital Media Distribution System (DMDS) is cloud-based and requires no dedicated hardware.

YANGAROO's DMDS Advertising network continues rapid growth as it has expanded to over 1000 leading US broadcast destinations. Advertisers and their agencies can now send content securely and immediately to networks and broadcast groups including the ESPN Network Group, Discovery Networks, MTV/Viacom Network Group, ABC Television Group, Belo Television, CBS Networks and the CBS Station Group, Fox Television Stations, Hearst Argyle Television Group, Sinclair Broadcasting and the Tribune Broadcasting Company. The rapid rate of adoption is a result of the streamlined and effective integration of the DMDS technology solution.

Charter clients include New York based Horizon Media, and Los Angeles based The Gary Group. Horizon clients Golden Corral and David's Bridal are among the first to have utilized the DMDS platform with others expected to follow. The Gary Group expects to begin delivering SD and HD television spots in June.

"The DMDS Advertising technology is a digital delivery platform that improves operating efficiencies, particularly with regard to HD spots, deliveries of which are growing at a tremendous pace," said Steve Faske , Senior V.P. Managing Director Business Affairs, at Horizon Media. "In addition to being a 'green' solution, DMDS offers a fast and easy way for members of our traffic team to manage flight schedules and traffic instructions."

"We have worked closely with YANGAROO as they have developed this industry leading technology," said Dick Gary , Chairman, The Gary Group. "We can save our clients time and money while making our own operation more efficient and effective."

"The DMDS implementation was easier than other content delivery systems that we work with. In fact, I was able to install, configure and test from over two thousand miles away for a facility that I manage remotely without any direct human intervention," said Scott Nielson , Four Points Media Engineering, KUTV / KUSG / WLWC / WTVX / WTCN / WWHB. "In my opinion, the YANGAROO DMDS system is a more complete and functional content delivery system than many of the other new players in this market space."

"With our success in helping the music and broadcast industries move to digital workflows for music and music video delivery, we saw a major opportunity to expand our business model to do the same for the advertising industry, particularly when we looked at the HD video content workflow and pricing models of the dominant players," said Karen Dealy , President, U.S. Advertising Operations. "With the shift to HD and the increased need for greater efficiency on tighter budgets, the time is right for DMDS Advertising." Top of Page

Vantage enables social project management

Upstart Industries has announced the launch of Vantage: A Social Approach to Project Management . Vantage is an online, subscription-based (SaaS) application which integrates project and portfolio management capabilities with enterprise social media.

Upstart co-founder Kelly Kazimer notes, "Anyone who has managed or participated in a project understands the challenges of maintaining focus on project goals, and ensuring that every project team member is on the same page. These challenges are often further compounded by adopting project tools at the project level, which creates information and communication silos within the organization. We created Vantage specifically to tackle these problems head on."

Vantage provides a collaborative web-space for project teams to manage, work with, and share projects. Tasks, resources, budgets, schedules, project plans, issues, risks can all be managed on a per project basis, using only a web browser. Beyond individual project management, Vantage provides you with an organizational view of all of your projects and resources. Every project's status and health can be viewed on a single page; every resource's allocation & participation can be viewed across all projects; every resource can view an integrated task list of their assignments from all of their projects.

Vantage uses its own secured social media channel, VantagePoint, to source not only user-generated content but also project activity within one central activity steam. When a schedule is published, a new resource added, or a new task assigned, VantagePoint notifies the team. At the same time, team members can use VantagePoint to update statuses, request approvals, seek consensus, flag issues, identify risks, and work together to achieve goals.

Kelly Kazimer explains, "As a solution, we created Vantage to support what we feel are the cornerstones of project success: communication, collaboration, visibility, and accountability. As a tool, we designed Vantage to be a business application that's as easy to use as the tools we use every day as consumers. Producing and consuming information has never been easier. And we applied those principles and expectations to Vantage."
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Adviso makes PROFIT Magazine's top 50 list

The internet consulting firm Adviso, is proud to be listed among the 50 fastest-growing companies in Canada according to PROFIT Magazine.

The firm has experienced growth of more than 1100 percent between 2005 and 2010 with revenue in excess of $2.4 million in 2010.

"We are very happy with our team's hard work and our customer satisfaction has been instrumental to our growth" says Simon Lamarche , Founding Partner. "As we continue to find innovative and creative web solutions, we strongly believe that Adviso will maintain its position as an industry leader in Canada ."

The 23rd annual PROFIT 200 is ranking Canada's Fastest-Growing Companies by five-year revenue growth, the PROFIT 200 profiles the country's most successful growth companies. Published in the summer issue of PROFIT and online at PROFITguide.com, the PROFIT 200 is Canada's largest annual celebration of entrepreneurial achievement.

"The PROFIT 200 companies are the innovative, high-growth enterprises Canada needs to compete on the global stage," says Ian Portsmouth , Editor-in-Chief of PROFIT Magazine. "PROFIT is proud to celebrate their achievements and ambitions, and we encourage all businesspeople to learn more about the many ways they've come so far, so fast." Top of Page

Contact's CEO wins tech entrepreneur award

Contac Services Inc., Canada's leading source for end to end data driven communication and supply chain solutions, is thrilled to announce the recent nomination and win for the 19th Annual BC New-Canadian Entrepreneur Award for Technology by the Ethno Business Council of British Columbia by their CEO, Riaz Pisani.

Riaz's involvement with Contac began more than 18 years ago as a Board Director. In 2004, he acquired an interest in Contac and became Managing Director and Chief Financial Officer one year before taking the helm as President and Chief Executive Officer in 2005.

Under his strategic leadership, Riaz has grown Contac from a small entrepreneurial business to an industry leader with alliances in North America and Europe . Riaz has lead Contac through significant corporate milestones. Through his unwavering determination, hard work and dedication, Riaz has managed to drive Contac to the forefront of the industries in which it operates, allowing it to grow exponentially in a time of worldwide economic uncertainty. Riaz believes in cultivating partnerships and strong relationships with clients and through these associations, Contac has flourished. Coupled with a very strong loyal client base, innovative technology products, state of the art national facilities and a very seasoned professional executive team, Contac has successfully expanded globally.

Riaz shares a dual passion for his business and his community and is acutely aware that with privilege comes responsibility. For this reason, he takes every opportunity to give back by supporting a variety of organizations and causes such as BC Children's Hospital, The Heart & Stroke Foundation, The American Heart Association, BC Breast Cancer Awareness, The Women & Children's Hospital Foundation of BC, Teddy Bears of Hope, The Miss Canada Pageant , The Maiwa Foundation, GAP Adventures, The Aga Khan Foundation, to name a few.
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